Sonoma calendar girls support Project Pink

Some of the Sonoma Arts Live “calendar girls” were on hand to donate a $2,000 check to Project Pink at the Sonoma Valley Hospital. Project Pink provides no-cost and low-cost mammograms to women in need in Sonoma County. Sonoma Arts Live, Sonoma’s local theater company, provided the funds for all the production costs of the calendar, which featured tastefully shot nude images – by local photographer Miller Oberlin – of 12 local women for the breast-cancer fundraiser.

The idea was inspired by a group of British women who, in the 1990s, came up with the idea of posing for a calendar to raise money for a worthy cause. These women’s idea inspired the play “Calendar Girls,” which was performed last spring in Sonoma Arts Live’s 2016 season. Doing the play inspired the idea to create a calendar and contribute to a local agency.

“This project was a labor of love, and we are so grateful to the women of Sonoma who stepped out of their comfort zone for a great cause,” says project coordinator Maralee Ebert. The Sonoma “calendar girls” were Cynthia Frank, Nancy Chomsky, Carol Patterson, Julie Forstadt, Jennifer Wood, Lori Bailey, Jaime Love, Maralee Ebert, Laela French, Paula Parks, Gemma Gallovich, Diana Tate, Deborah Emery, with styling support from Donna Kelly and Karen Donovan.

“What a wonderful gift from Sonoma Arts Live to the Sonoma Valley Hospital Foundation. We are grateful that their support of the Project Pink program will have significant impact by helping to ensure access to mammography for all women in Sonoma Valley,” said Sonoma Valley Hospital Foundation Director Dave Pier.